Sirte

In a letter to United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, Greece's permanent representative to the organization, Evangelos Sekeris, says that Libya's recent decision to declare a 24-nautical mile contiguous zone, extending beyond its 12-nautical mile territorial sea, violates international law in three key respects.

Turkey welcomed the reopening of a strategic coastal road linking Libya's east to its west, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said on July 31.

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"We welcome the official opening of the Misrata - Sirte Coastal Road on 30 July 2021, which has been closed for a long time," it said in a statement.

Forces loyal to Libya's internationally recognized government captured the last major stronghold of eastern commander Khalifa Haftar near Tripoli on June 5, capping the sudden collapse of his 14-month offensive on the capital.

Libya's U.N.-recognized Government of National Accord (GNA) said ON March 3 that its forces killed 20 militia members loyal to renegade Gen. Khalifa Haftar in Sirte.

The militia members were killed in an airstrike, Mustafa al-Mujie, the spokesman for the GNA-led Burkan Al-Ghadab (Volcano of Rage) Operation, told Anadolu Agency.

The head of the U.N. on Jan. 4 urged an "immediate ceasefire" in war-weary Libya where the internationally recognized Government of National Accord (GNA) fights forces affiliated with Gen. Khalifa Haftar.

East Libyan forces said they had launched air strikes on Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) fighters after the militants made incursions south and east of their former coastal stronghold of Sirte.

In the district of Al-Giza al-Bahriya in Libya's Sirte, the sea breeze mingles with the stench of corpses decomposing under the rubble.

The coastal neighborhood was the last part of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant's (ISIL) north African bastion to fall to unity government-allied forces on Dec. 5 after nearly seven months of fighting.

Libyan forces in the final stages of a six-month campaign to recapture Sirte from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) said they freed 14 civilians on Nov. 6 from a small residential area where some militants are holding out. 

One of Libya's rival governments resigned on April 5, a step that helps efforts by a new, U.N.-brokered unity government to assert itself in the capitol, Tripoli, despite opposition from some local militias.

U.S. President Barack Obama directed his national security advisers on Jan. 28 to counter efforts by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) to expand into Libya and other countries, the White House said.

ISIL militants have taken advantage of chaos in Libya to establish themselves in the city of Sirte, and they have carried out several attacks on oil installations this month.